Microsoft fires four employees for illegal on-site anti-Israel demonstrations

The global tech giant Microsoft has fired four employees after they participated in illegal anti-Israel demonstrations at the Microsoft headquarters in Seattle. 

The anti-Israel protest group No Azure for Apartheid said Wednesday that employees Anna Hatle and Riki Fameli were fired via voicemail. The group’s name refers to Microsoft’s Azure software, which activists claim Israel has misused during the ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza.

“We are here because Microsoft continues to provide Israel with the tools it needs to commit genocide while gaslighting and misdirecting its own workers about this reality,” Hattle said in a statement. The group has demanded that Microsoft severs its ties with Israel and pays financial reparations to Gazan residents. 

The anti-Israel group on Thursday added that employees Julius Shan and Nisreen Jaradat had also been fired by Microsoft. 

The tech company justified its decision by stressing that the illegal on-site demonstrations had “created significant safety concerns.”

For instance Hattle and Fameli were among seven anti-Israel activists who were arrested after illegally occupying the office of the company President Brad Smith. 

Smith responded to the incident by emphasizing that Microsoft respects “freedom of expression that everyone in this country enjoys as long as they do it lawfully.”

Israel has strongly rejected the accusation of genocide in Gaza. Israeli political and military officials have emphasized that Hamas operatives deliberately use Gazan civilians as human shields while the Israeli military seeks to minimize the civilian casualties. The United States, Germany and other leading Western powers have also rejected the charge of genocide in Gaza. 

Microsoft announced in May that it had provided technical emergency assistance to Israel in the efforts to locate Israeli civilians held by Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip. However, the company denied that its technologies had been used in any unlawful way to harm civilians. 

“We do occasionally provide special access to our technologies beyond the terms of our commercial agreements. In addition to the commercial relationship with the IMOD (Israel Ministry of Defense), Microsoft provided limited emergency support to the Israeli government in the weeks following October 7, 2023, to help rescue hostages. We provided this help with significant oversight and on a limited basis, including approval of some requests and denial of others. We believe the company followed its principles on a considered and careful basis, to help save the lives of hostages while also honoring the privacy and other rights of civilians in Gaza,” Microsoft said in an official statement. 

“Microsoft has long defended the cybersecurity of the State of Israel and the people who live there. We similarly have long been committed to other nations and people across the Middle East. Our commitment to human rights guides how we engage in complex environments and how our technology is used,” the tech company added. 

The claim that Israel is using technologies to target civilians in Gaza is not supported by any credible evidence. Quite the opposite, Israeli officials told The New York Times in March 2024 that the Israeli military used AI facial recognition in order to identify terrorists and thereby avoid harming civilians in Gaza.